Film Movement has acquired all North American rights to Justin Lerner’s The Automatic Hate. The distributor plans a winter theatrical release for the film, which world premiered at SXSW. The Automatic Hate stars Joseph Cross, Adelaide Clemens, Richard Schiff, Ricky Jay and Deborah Ann Woll. The film’s screenplay is written by Lerner and Katharine O’Brien, and produced by Lerner along with Lacey Leavitt and Anonymous Content’s Alix Madigan-Yorkin. Daniel Alexander, Gabriela Revilla Lugo, Kerianne Flynn, Debra Minoff Weinstein and BN Film’s Lucas Akoskin and Alex Garcia served as executive producers.

It explores what happens when Davis Green’s cousin appears on his doorstep one night and he discovers that a side of his family has been kept secret for his entire life. Against his father’s wishes, Davis travels to rural, Upstate New York to meet his other cousins. As he and Alexis attempt to reunite their families, they try to uncover the shocking secret that tore their families apart, while wrestling with a taboo attraction to each other.